Bryant was 27 years (and 152 days) old when he dropped 81 points.
Jordan was 27 years (and 115 days) old when he won his first Finals MVP.
Bryant avg 40.75 ppg in the previous 4 games before the 81 point explosion.
Jordan avg 2.8 STL and 1.4 BLK in the NBA 1991 finals.
How many points would that Kobe Bryant score against that Michael Jordan?
by WallStreetDoesntBet
7 Comments
6 for 24 from field
Probably between 40-50. He was cooking Mo Peterson, Jose Calderon and Jalen Rose most of the night. Whole different animals than Mike. Mike not letting him get 60 though.
He woulda dropped 60 himself.
Mike 60
Kobe 52
Bulls win
Maybe 30. If Kobe was averaging 40 ppg in the previous four games, I’d go with less than his average from that stretch
I think Jordan one time spoke on this and said something like once Kobe got to high 40s or 50, he would have just started fouling him super hard so he wouldn’t want to play the rest of the game.
This is a tough one. The goal of the defender is to either force a turnover or force the offensive player into a bad shot. But Kobe’s particular skill was hitting what would normally be bad shots (20 foot fadeaways, shooting over and through double teams, contested layups, that kind of thing), so I am not sure how much even good defense would have mattered. That said while Kobe was a great athlete I think prime Jordan had the advantage there (he had the advantage on basically everyone). Jordan definitely slows him down and does good ball denial, so no way Kobe scores quite as much.
But I think the main way Jordan keeps Kobe’s points lower is by giving Kobe someone he had to really guard on the other end. I don’t think Kobe would just take the night off defensively if he was going against someone like MJ (too competitive for that), and MJ just had a better motor than Kobe. 91 MJ was scoring 30 points a game while also picking guys up full court a lot of the time.
Jordan was bigger, faster, stronger, more bouncy, had a better wingspan, played better defense, and passed better. Idk though.
Kobe would call MJ at 2 and 3 am and pick his brain when MJ retired. By the time Kobe is 27 he took what MJ taught him and adapted it to his era. Kobe isn’t scoring 80 but he isn’t scoring 20 either. I’d say 35 but 35 against prime MJ is a feat in itself.